


Keep Breathing

by Winterling42



Series: Flesh and Blood and Dust [19]
Category: His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman, Mad Max Series (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemons, Backstory, Gen, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-11
Updated: 2016-05-11
Packaged: 2018-06-07 19:53:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 616
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6821779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Winterling42/pseuds/Winterling42
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Wives support each other as much as they can, but sometimes living in the Vault is between just you and your daemon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Keep Breathing

They waited up for her.

They always did, and Toast did the same for them when Joe took any of the others. Later, maybe, she’d make a crude joke and Capable would pretend not to smile and the Dag would laugh too loud, and they would turn over in their little twin beds and go to sleep.

Now, she was raw and sore and sticky, and she wanted nothing so much as to be completely and utterly alone. Tarl limped along at her heels, and she couldn’t bear the thought of carrying him like that but she slowed down anyway, so that she wouldn’t leave him behind. Together, separate, they made their way down into the pool and avoided the sympathetic looks the others threw their way.

The Dag, who understood more than she let on, left first, Pheona at her side. Capable stepped forward, soft shushes of bare feet along the stone, but Toast only scrubbed pointedly at Tarl’s matted fur and Capable gave up before she’d said a word. Angharad stayed the longest; not speaking, not commiserating or trying to make anything better. Just there, an itch at the back of Toast’s eyes.

Toast stayed in the pool until Angharad gave up her waiting and went to bed, until her fingers were wrinkled and soft and cold in the unnaturally cold Vault. She climbed out of the pool soaking but not clean, and Tarl shook enough water out of his fur to fill it up a second time. Normally the puddle and his disgruntled snorts would have made her smile, but Toast was feeling full of some unfamiliar deadness, and she only tracked wet footprints in and curled up, her hair still dripping, on the creaking old bedsprings.

“What if this never ends?” she whispered to Tarl, after he’d reached the bed and flopped down next to her.

“It will,” he muttered, sighing. “Everything ends.”

“It doesn’t feel like this will,” Toast tried to hide the despair in her voice, cover it up with something less desperate and clinging. “Unless I’m the one to end it.”

Tarl growled, took her hand in his mouth and bit down just hard enough for her to feel his teeth. “Don’t _ever_ ,” he said, letting her go. “That’s the monster’s doing too, Toast. Don’t ever let him win.”

“He’s already won,” she snarled, bitter. Afraid.

“Not so long as I am Tarl, and you are Toast the Knowing,” her daemon said, and despite the fact that it had been Him to give her the title, she felt a little bud of pride. Knowing how to shoot a gun and ride a bike and call shots with her daemon in a sling on her back. That was something to be proud of.

This, lying here letting water soak into her sheets and the ratty blanket, knowing the other Wives were only pretending not to listen. That was not something for pride, or even sympathy. Was she even still herself, once His seed had washed in and out of her like some red tide?

“Enough!” Tarl snapped, and it was loud enough that she heard the others stirring. “I wouldn’t let you leave me here, no more than you would let me. You are Toast, and I am Tarl, and we are more than what He sees.”

“We are not things,” Toast said, and she meant to say it sarcastically but somehow it came out sincere instead. Tarl’s badger face crinkled up in a smile, and he pushed his wet nose against her palm, where his teeth still showed red against her skin.

“That’s right. Now go to sleep, Knowing girl, and think of a way to kill him tomorrow.”


End file.
